Monday, January 31, 2011

“Secularism can never enjoy a general acceptance in an Islamic society.” The writer was not one of those sulfurous Islamophobes decried by CAIR and the professional Left. Quite the opposite: It was Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, the Muslim Brotherhood’s spiritual guide and a favorite of the Saudi royal family. He made this assertion in his book, How the Imported Solutions Disastrously Affected Our Ummah, an excerpt of which was published by the Saudi Gazette just a couple of months ago.This was Qaradawi the “progressive” Muslim intellectual, much loved by Georgetown University’s burgeoning Islamic-studies programs. Like Harvard, Georgetown has been purchased into submission by tens of millions of Saudi petrodollars. In its resulting ardor to put Americans at ease about Islam, the university somehow manages to look beyond Qaradawi’s fatwas calling for the killing of American troops in Iraq and for suicide bombings in Israel. Qaradawi, they tell us, is a “moderate.” In fact, as Robert Spencer quips, if you were to say Islam and secularism cannot co-exist, John Esposito, Georgetown’s apologist-in-chief, would call you an Islamophobe; but when Qaradawi says it, no problem — according to Esposito, he’s a “reformist.”

And he’s not just any reformist. Another Qaradawi fan, Feisal Rauf, the similarly “moderate” imam behind the Ground Zero mosque project, tells us Qaradawi is also “the most well-known legal authority in the whole Muslim world today.”

Rauf is undoubtedly right about that. So it is worth letting it sink in that this most influential of Islam’s voices, this promoter of the Islamic enclaves the Brotherhood is forging throughout the West, is convinced that Islamic societies can never accept secularism. After all, secularism is nothing less than the framework by which the West defends religious freedom but denies legal and political authority to religious creeds.

It is also worth understanding why Qaradawi says Islam and secularism cannot co-exist. The excerpt from his book continues:

As Islam is a comprehensive system of worship (Ibadah) and legislation (Shari’ah), the acceptance of secularism means abandonment of Shari’ah, a denial of the divine guidance and a rejection of Allah’s injunctions. It is indeed a false claim that Shari’ah is not proper to the requirements of the present age. The acceptance of a legislation formulated by humans means a preference of the humans’ limited knowledge and experiences to the divine guidance: “Say! Do you know better than Allah?” (Qur’an, 2:140) For this reason, the call for secularism among Muslims is atheism and a rejection of Islam. Its acceptance as a basis for rule in place of Shari’ah is downright apostasy.

Apostasy is an explosive accusation. On another occasion, Sheikh Qaradawi explained that “Muslim jurists are unanimous that apostates must be punished.” He further acknowledged that the consensus view of these jurists, including the principal schools of both Sunni and Shiite jurisprudence, is “that apostates must be executed.”

Qaradawi’s own view is more nuanced, as he explained to the Egyptian press in 2005. This, I suppose, is where his vaunted reformist streak comes in. For private apostasy, in which a Muslim makes a secret, personal decision to renounce tenets of Islam and quietly goes his separate way without causing a stir, the sheikh believes ostracism by the Islamic community is a sufficient penalty, with the understanding that Allah will condemn the apostate to eternal damnation at the time of his choosing. Forpublic apostasy, however, Qaradawi stands with the overwhelming weight of Islamic authority: “The punishment . . . is execution.”

The sad fact, the fact no one wants to deal with but which the Ground Zero mosque debate has forced to the fore, is that Qaradawi is a moderate. So is Feisal Rauf, who endorses the Qaradawi position — the mainstream Islamic position — that sharia is a nonnegotiable requirement. Rauf wins the coveted “moderate” designation because he strains, at least when speaking for Western consumption, to paper over the incompatibility between sharia societies and Western societies.

Qaradawi and Rauf are “moderates” because we’ve abandoned reason. Our opinion elites are happy to paper over the gulf between “reformist” Islam and the “reformist” approval of mass-murder attacks. That’s why it matters not a whit to them that Imam Rauf refuses to renounce Hamas: If you’re going to give a pass to Qaradawi, the guy who actively promotes Hamas terrorists, how can you complain about a guy who merely refuses to condemn the terrorists?

When we are rational, we have confidence in our own frame of reference. We judge what is moderate based on a detached, commonsense understanding of what “moderate” means. We’re not rigging the outcome; we just want to know where we stand.

If we were in that objective frame of mind, we would easily see that a freedom culture requires separation of the spiritual from the secular. We would also see that sharia — with dictates that contradict liberty and equality while sanctioning cruel punishments and holy war — is not moderate. Consequently, no one who advocates sharia can be a moderate, no matter how well-meaning he may be, no matter how heartfelt may be his conviction that this is God’s will, and no matter how much higher on the food chain he may be than Osama bin Laden.

Instead, abandoning reason, we have deep-sixed our own frame of reference and substituted mainstream Islam’s. If that backward compass is to be our guide, then sure, Qaradawi and Rauf are moderates. But know this: When you capitulate to the authority and influence of Qaradawi and Rauf, you kill meaningful Islamic reform.

There is no moderate Islam in the mainstream of Muslim life, not in the doctrinal sense. There are millions of moderate Muslims who crave reform. Yet the fact that they seek real reform, rather than what Georgetown is content to call reform, means they are trying to invent something that does not currently exist.

Real reform can also be found in some Muslim sects. The Ahmadi, for example, hold some unorthodox views and reject violent jihad. Witness what happens: They are brutally persecuted by Muslims in Pakistan, as well as in Indonesia and other purported hubs of moderation.

Meanwhile, individual Muslim reformers are branded apostates, meaning not only that they are discredited, but that their lives are threatened as well. The signal to other Muslims is clear: Follow the reformers and experience the same fury. As Qaradawi put it in the 2005 interview, public apostates are “the gravest danger” to Islamic society; therefore, Muslims must snuff them out, lest their reforms “spread like wildfire in a field of thorns.”

Today, “moderate Islam” is an illusion. There is hardly a spark, much less a wildfire. Making moderation real will take more than wishing upon a star. It calls for a gut check, a willingness to face down not just al-Qaeda but the Qaradawis and their sharia campaign. It means saying: Not here.

‘Islam is a religion of peace and the great majority of Muslims are not party to any plans and actions of the radicals’- so claim academic pundits, leftist journalists, and hired Islamic apologists. The incantation of these “authorities” is the lullaby that puts the people into a sleep of complacency.

Complacency and appeasement on the part of the free world and those well-meaning, non-practicing Muslims, can only serve Islam. There is no chance for co-existence with Islam. All one needs to know is to see what is happening in Islamic countries. That is exactly what is in store for the presently free people of the world if Islam is not held in check.

The average free person, who is busy with all manner of demands on his time and resources, would hardly want to worry about the very real threat which mainstream Islam poses to his life and to his future. It is so much easier to accept the claims of authorities who assure us not to worry; ‘it’s just a tiny minority of extremists’, and ‘soon the great majority of “moderates” will triumph over the crazy zealots’. So we lull ourselves back to the comfort of our pretenses, serene in knowing that the “experts” have it all under control.

Wait! Aren’t these the same experts who told us Hitler could not possibly be crazy enough to attack Russia or Britain? Aren’t these the same “experts” who tried to cover up Mao Tse Tung’s reign of terror in China, or Pol Pot’s genocide in Cambodia? Isn’t this the same “expertise” that assured us in the 1970’s that inflation was good, and could never be accompanied by recession?

Aren’t these the same folks who tell us the Saudis are our best friends in the Middle East, that the Titanic was unsinkable, that we should not succumb to our racist impulses by reporting suspicious Muslim men who are learning to fly jumbo jets, and that goods imported from China are perfectly safe? Or that if we just “open up dialogue with our enemies,” we can create peace?? Hmmm... It seems like we have much to worry about when the “authorities” begin to disseminate their collective wisdom. And don't bank on the politicians either. They are the master practitioners of the art of the politically correct.

Yet, some of these professional advocates of Islam go farther by accusing those who sound the alarm as racist, bigots, hatemongers and much more. That attitude sure worked well for England, Holland and France!

But the elites who scold us and seduce us into our slumbering acquiescence never allow their dismal record of intellectual failure to prevent them from claiming ever more enlightenment. Their present project is to ‘build a bridge to moderate Islam’.

Let us, for the record, be clear on this subject one more time: Islamism, Islamofascism, Radical Islam, Political Islam, and Militant Islam are different terms for essentially the same thing, a virulent, hateful, dangerous and violent system of beliefs and practices. Yet, one and all are progeny and mutation of Islam itself.

Islam in all of its forms and sects is simply an evil ideology that is practiced by all Muslims, an ideology that increasingly is manifesting in evil, inhuman and murderous manifestations Islamism is a pincer, with the world in its jaws between the end-of-the-world Shiism and the jihadist Sunnis. To the simple mind of western “intellectuals”, within every ideology there must always be “good liberals” and “bad conservatives,” and so they search in vain for the “moderate”, “reasonable” and “pragmatic” wing of any threatening ideology.

But in their enormous ignorance of the realities of Islam, they fail to realize that in Islam, the wings are not “left” and “right”, or “liberal” vs. “conservative”; they are two jaws in the same supremacist device that aims to crush the life of all non-believers. I will explain why attempting to build a bridge to “moderate” Islam is in fact a road to hell, since “moderate Islam” is oxymoronic. Any moderacy in Islam is in fact incompatible and in conflict with essential Islam, its power structure and its controlling proponents.

The so-called “Moderate Muslims” or “Secular Muslims” would like to have their cake and eat it too. They wish to remain Muslim in name only, yet not bother to read the mandates of the Quran or understand the context in which Muhammad foisted his inconsistent poisonous prophecy upon the world. One which melds at time with the tone and fervor of the Old and New Testament and one which at other times is exclusory, racist, imperialistic, dominating and self-aggrandizing at the expense of all western norms and ideas developing over the last many millennia.

Instead of conclusively demonstrating Islam's violent nature from its very inception and moving in another direction with what they can prove is the worthwhile portions of Islam, they have decided to marry an inherently noxious religion with an inherently godless philosophy.

Also, these happy-go-lucky people-of-Islam are indeed delusional, for Muhammad’s record is not even the subject of debate. His utterances and deeds are a part of history that is simply not debatable. Islam is what Muhammad said it was in the diatribes of vitriol and hatred that abounds in is the Quran; and Islam is what Muhammad did during his violent life. If you accept Islam as your religion, you become a part of the guiding principles of hatred, revenge, and rejection of prior enlightened prophecies. But the “bridge-builders” refuse to acknowledge the fact that one cannot be a Muslim and not abide by the dictates of the Quran.

Keep in mind that the fact being a Muslim is a clear admission of wrongdoing, the extent of which depends on the degree of a person’s Muslim-ness. If he is only a Muslim who does not practice Islam, then he is, at the very least, guilty of hypocrisy. If he is somewhat of a Muslim by tithing, from time to time, following the ranting of the local mullah or imam, and swallowing whole the pronouncements of the high divines, then he is guilty of significantly contributing to the evildoing of Islam. One cannot practice one's religion as if on an island, ignoring one's co-religionist's Jihadist and terrorist tendencies. Either one rails openly and publicly against those preventing what one believes to be the pure and positive core of one's beliefs, or one becomes a co-conspirator in the continuing perversion of the religion of more than a billion protagonists.

It is time for the non-practicing Muslims to abandon their childish desire to an uncompromising ideology and cling to an evil, yet pretend they can “reform” it, like the abused wife insisting that she can cure her alcoholic, violent spouse by remaining in a codependent relationship. It’s time the self-described “moderates” either accept the truth of their ugly religious ethics and reject them by joining the forces of liberty and worldwide family of free people, or join the forces of darkness. But to join the peace-loving free world, you must immediately stop making excuses for a religion that expresses malevolence and hate more often than democracy tolerance towards other religions and peoples.

Here is my 10-point process to understand why Islam cannot be “moderated,” for the benefit of those misguided people who are the advocates of “Secular Islam.” I will show that “Secular Islam” an impossibility.

1_The first question that must be answered is whether or not any doctrine can be called “evil”. If nothing is good or evil, then all of life is inherently nihilistic, and all thinkers and believers in life (all of us) are necessarily nihilists. We must establish a way to measure “evil.”

Take for example, Naziism. How are we to know that the Nazi party was evil, and that present-day believers in Nazi principles are doing evil? We certainly cannot use traditional Islamic mea culpas, to rid Nazis of their well deserved guilt! We can’t look at present day Nazis who are demonstrably not trying to take over the world. We can’t ask the average Nazis on the street to declare themselves authorities on their entire cult.

We can’t just look at the actions of some of them, for in doing so, we could simply assert that the good Nazi party was hijacked by “radicals”. It is certainly true that the vast majority of German supporters of the Nazi party in 1936 were normal, peaceful people who were simply held hostage by the zealots. If you took a random “Nazi”, you’d be vastly more likely to condemn him for his taste for Sauerkraut rather than see him participate in an actual murder.

So we have the same excuses at work that exist in the debate over Islam, but today we condemn Naziism as evil. If it is illegitimate to simply look for a nice Nazi, and try to build a bridge to the Nazi power structure through him, then how can we think we can do it with Islam? We think so because we have presupposed with 20/20 vision that Naziism is bad, and yet because of the forces of politically correct, we believe that Islam is not. But this begs the question: How then do we know what evil is, so we can condemn it? Nowadays the liberal mantra is that all cultures, all peoples, all religions are merely shades of the same gray and only understanding separates us - that good an evil are primitive concepts that have no place in an overly rich and powerful America.

The answer is that the only way to determine if a thing is evil or neutral or good is to establish a working definition of what constitutes evil and its opposite, good, and then test the doctrine against the definition.

While it is true that many people will disagree on the precise definition, it does not matter. Let each person establish the definition for him or herself, and at least be logical and fair in evaluating the evidence of the creed. In other words, deal with the consequences of the process, no matter how hard the findings are to accept. The Bible says, “You shall know them by their fruits.”

2_Once a definition is in place, the only way to evaluate a belief system under any accepted definition is to read the foundational books, the manuscripts that define the creed...the scripture that was carefully written to explain the norms and intent of those who established it. You cannot ask a Nazi whether he thinks he is evil. He will tell you he is good, and that you are evil for resisting him, because he is defending his “people” against those who resist his beliefs. This is exactly what Muhammad said about the Jews and Christians who resisted him.

“Thus (will it be said): ‘Taste ye then of the (punishment): for those who resist Allah, is the penalty of the Fire.’" Quran 8.014

“And when those who disbelieve plot against thee (O Muhammad) to wound thee fatally, or to kill thee or to drive thee forth; they plot, but Allah (also) plotteth; and Allah is the best of plotters.” Quran 8.030

“And fight them until persecution is no more, and religion is all for Allah. But if they cease (in defeat), then lo! Allah is Seer of what they do.” Quran 8.039

You cannot allow a random Nazi member to provide personal anecdotal opinion and declare it to be authoritative. Only the written treatises of the founders and their subsequent actions may be taken as true expression of the belief system. You cannot take a third-party account of Nazi goodness to be superior to the Nazi party principles and the philosophy espoused in Mein Kampf. That would be ignoring Hitler’s beliefs in exchange for that of an outside observer commenting on Hitler’s beliefs. The same is true for Islamic apologists. We can’t just trot out any “scholar” and declare him to be authoritative over the words and deeds of the most important figures in Islamic history.

Once we have found the foundational texts which declare the basis and purpose of the creed, in order to validate the creed as it is written we must test if the leaders of the creed are in fact true to their words; one must look at historical actions of those who rose in rank through the belief system. Look at their words, actions, and reactions as their lives played out to see if they were consistent in representing their own creed. This is how you test whether or not a doctrine is evil.

3_Having defined evil, and having isolated the relevant foundational texts, we can move ahead. If we find a group of people who adhere strictly to their codes of conduct as established in their scripture, we cannot place these people on the sidelines of their religion as aberrations or “extremists”. Such attempts to marginalize the fundamentalist believers in a religious movement are the product of highly confused and illogical thinking.

A person cannot be “extreme” with respect to her religion if she is in alignment with all of its commandments and admonishments. Being highly devout is “fundamentalism,” but it is not extreme or radical. The reason we wish to believe that a Buddhist who never steps on an ant is “extreme” is because we realize that the behavior is unusual and difficult to accomplish, inasmuch as almost nobody can live up to its ideals.

But to view an action that is rare and strange to you, and then declare that, because it occupies a far-off position with respect to your personal beliefs and capability to align, it is therefore “extreme” with respect to its own religious dictates, is highly illogical and quite frankly stupid. And this is the precise “logic” that is used by those who wipe the Islamic slate clean, declaring all inhumane practices and advocation in Islam to be the handiwork of “extremists.” Such muddled thinking does nothing to advance our understanding of the creed, the evil it does, and its dangers to mankind.

If we use this process and we objectively find that Islam as it is currently practiced by many satisfies the definition of evil, we cannot then be subject to the insults of the ignorant who themselves refuse to conduct a like investigation. We cannot be accused of being “Nazis” ourselves simply because our rational discovery and analysis process uncovered true evil. It would be the height of absurdity to declare that an anti-Nazi is just as bad as a Nazi for vehemently opposing Nazi thinking! The same must be true for Islam.

4_ I won’t get into every nuance of the reasons; any average person can define evil and read the Quran and come away with the sole conclusion that it is evil. Only those of us who have bothered to read the Quran and parts of the Hadith and Sunna and who have bothered to read history and take note of present-day Islamic violence and oppression in light of their dark beliefs can say that we have good reason to declare Islam in its present form an evil cult. But suffice it to say that Islam, as configured by Muhammad and as interpreted over the centuries, essentially boils down to the following principles:

a. Jews and Christians are, per se, the epitome of evil to Islamic thinking. Pagans are also evil, but somewhat less insulting to Allah, since the Jews and Christians received prophecy and “rejected” it.

One of many such verses of hate: “Those who reject (Truth) (Islam), among the People of the Book and among the Polytheists, will be in Hell-Fire, to dwell therein (for aye). They are the worst of creatures.” Quran 098.006

b. Therefore Jews and Christians are offensive to Allah. The worse between them is the Jew. The world will not be restored to Allah’s preferences until all Jews are defeated and entirely eradicated.

One of many such verses of hate: “Say: ‘shall I point out to you something much worse than this (referring to the previous verses), as judged by the treatment it received from Allah? Those who incurred the curse of Allah and His wrath (Jews), those of whom some He transformed into apes and swine, those who worshipped evil;- these are (many times) worse in rank, and far more astray from the even path!’” Quran 5.060

c. Muslims believe that those who resist conversion to Islam and the establishment of the prominence of Islamic global domination are Islam’s enemies who can never be trusted or treated as equals.

One of many such verses of hate: “O ye who believe! Take not my enemies and yours as friends (or protectors),- offering them (your) love, even though they have rejected the Truth that has come to you, and have (on the contrary) driven out the Prophet and yourselves (from your homes), (simply) because ye believe in Allah your Lord! If ye have come out to strive in My Way and to seek My Good Pleasure, (take them not as friends), holding secret converse of love (and friendship) with them: for I know full well all that ye conceal and all that ye reveal. And any of you that does this has strayed from the Straight Path.” Quran 60.001

d. Allah calls on Muslims (believers) to use their corporeal power to murder Jews, Christians, and people of other religions and to destroy their nations, cities and institutions, until they sue for peace and either become Muslims or pay for the privilege of being ruled by a world Islamic order.

One of many such verses of hate: Volume 4, Book 52, Number 176:
Narrated 'Abdullah bin 'Umar: Allah's Apostle said, "You (i.e. Muslims) will fight the Jews till some of them will hide behind stones. The stones will (betray them) saying, 'O 'Abdullah (i.e. slave of Allah)! There is a Jew hiding behind me; so kill him.' "

One of many such verses of hate: Volume 4, Book 52, Number 196:
Narrated Abu Huraira: Allah’s Apostle said, " I have been ordered to fight with the people till they say, 'None has the right to be worshipped but Allah,' and whoever says, 'None has the right to be worshipped but Allah,' his life and property will be saved by me except for Islamic law, and his accounts will be with Allah, (either to punish him or to forgive him.)"

e. Forget all you know about spiritually uplifting ideals of brotherly love and peace (the word “love” is nearly absent in the Quran). Peace and earthly enlightenment only comes after slaughter and victory in a war in which Islam is victorious. If, in any battle or time period, Islam is not victorious, Muslims must lie in wait until the right time and then ambush their enemies and establish Islamic rule. Until that time, policies of terrorism and deceit are both sanctioned and advised.

Volume 4, Book 52, Number 220:
Narrated Abu Huraira: Allah's Apostle said, "I have been sent with the shortest expressions bearing the widest meanings, and I have been made victorious with terror (cast in the hearts of the enemy), and while I was sleeping, the keys of the treasures of the world were brought to me and put in my hand." Abu Huraira added: Allah's Apostle has left the world and now you, people, are bringing out those treasures (i.e. the Prophet did not benefit by them).

Excerpt Q-33:25-27
Set 66, Count 131-133 [33.25]...Allah sufficed the believers in fighting... [33.26]...some [Jews] you killed and you took captive another part. [33.27]...He made you heirs to their [Jewish] land and their dwellings and their property, and (to) a land which you have not yet trodden...

(So much for the theory that Muslims don’t have a religious mandate to claim Jewish lands...that the “Palestinian” problem is all the fault of the Jews...so on and so forth)

f. Islam calls for robotic acceptance of minute and grand prescriptions covering every aspect of a Muslim’s life. Therefore, Islam is not personally or spiritually relevant. It is political, which is why it may never separate itself from government. Adherence is not a matter of voluntary devotion, but of the Law, and violators are severely punished, including capital punishment as in Sharia.

The principle of “an eye for an eye” (retribution/revenge) is supreme in all social interaction. Praying five times daily, wearing headscarves, ablution, abstaining from alcohol, etc... all this is done not out of personal belief that it is proper, but because Allah says so, and nobody may violate Allah’s written commandments.

g. Men are the strong and superior. Women are the weak and inferior. Women must be kept ignorant and within a low social class so they do not abuse the Islamic order by seeking equality.

“Men have authority over women because Allah has made the one superior to the others and because they spend their wealth to maintain them. Good women are obedient. They guard their unseen parts because Allah has guarded them. As for those from whom you fear disobedience, admonish them and send them to beds apart and beat them. Then if they obey you take no further action against them. Allah is high, supreme.” Quran 4.34

Islam strictly forbids women to participate in many activities in which men are involved. In Islam, women are not in the calculus—women are incidental and merely exist for the pleasure of men.

The words “naghess al aghl” literally means defected witted person. It describes the intellectual capability of women in general. And the word “zaeefeh”, is referred directly to female gender in contrast to men, meaning “the weaker one”, in a condescending fashion.

“By another sign He (Allah) gave you wives from among yourselves, that you (men) might live in joy with them, and planted love and kindness in your hearts. Surely there are signs in this for thinking men.” Quran 32.21

h. Muslims are entitled, in fact required, to wage war on all non-Islamic thoughts and deeds. Any who mock or disrespect the prophet Muhammad are to be murdered by honor-bound Muslim enforcers.

4:162b Muhammad said, "My livelihood is under the shade of my spear, and he who disobeys my orders will be humiliated by paying Jizya." ["Jizya" is the poll tax paid by subjugated peoples in return for the protection of the Islamic government.]
4:196 Mohammad said, "I have been ordered to fight with the people till they say, ‘None has the right to be worshiped but Allah,’ and whoever says, ‘None has the right to be worshiped by Allah,’ his life and property will be saved by me except for Islamic law, and his accounts will be with Allah (either to punish him or to forgive him.)"

4:220 Muhammad said, "... I have been made victorious with terror (cast in the hearts of the enemy) ..."

The 69th verse of Sûrah Anfãl declares:
“Eat ye the spoils of war. They are lawful and pure.”

“The apostle (Muhammad) said, ‘Kill any Jew that falls into your power.’ Hereupon Muhayyisa b. Masud leapt upon Ibn Sunayna, a Jewish merchant with whom they had social and business relations, and killed him. Huwayyisa was not a Muslim at the time though he was the elder brother. When Muhayyisa killed him Huwayyisa began to beat him, saying, 'You enemy of God, did you kill him when much of the fat on your belly comes from his wealth?' Muhayyisa answered, 'Had the one who ordered me to kill him ordered me to kill you I would have cut your head off.'” 61

In another terrorist action, Muhammad asked his men to murder an old Jewish man, Abu Afak. “’Who will deal with this rascal for me?’ The killing of such an old man moved a poetess, Asma b. Marwan, to compose disrespectful verses about the Prophet, and she too was assassinated.” When the assassin prayed with the prophet at al-Medina, Muhammad said to him: "’Have you slain the daughter of Marwan?’ The assassin said: ‘Yes. Is there something more for me to do?’ He [Muhammad] said: ‘No two goats will butt together about her.’”62...” (from Islam is not Salaam, by CS Karlson, 2004)

i. All contemporary written scripture is corrupted, and only the Quran is the truth. Muhammad is the highest authority, as Allah’s primary and final prophet. Even the Quran contains contradictions and infusions of verses by Satan (note: Muhammad actually codified this concept in the Quran, the subject of Rushdie’s book, the “Satanic Verses”). But in order to eradicate Satanic infusion, whenever a passage conflicts with another, only the latter one may be understood as correct...because Allah will always trump Satan. The Quran (surviving, unabrogated prophesy) and its ethical commandments are eternal, perfect, and immutable.

j. This is why any references to “peaceful” earlier scriptures have been completely abrogated by evil scripture that is congruent with only older, violent scripture. What we have left is a book that is unbelievably sickening in its hateful attitudes and inhumane practices. This is why you cannot believe an ignorant Muslim who quotes abrogated scripture, such as “there should be no compulsion in religion”...that phrase was abrogated hundreds of times, and it is enraging to have to point out such obvious contradictions.

5_ Conclusion: These unalterable and undilutable sentiments represent that which is wrong, sinful, erroneous, ill-advised, and just plain evil.

6_ Moreover, anyone who acts consistently in the advocation and advancement of these ethics is adhering to Islam as it was intended. They are fundamentalists, like the Christian who consistently turns the other cheek, or the Buddhist who is careful never to step on a bug, but they are not extremists.

An extremist Christian would for example claim that Christ did not intend for people to forgive each other and express the final commandment for brotherly love, but rather to beat each other until they accepted Christ as God, and to reject anyone who did not believe as they do. Perhaps some, even many, Christians think that the latter is correct, but according to scripture, they are wrong. This is easily identifiable in the New Testament and is a consistent theme in Christ’s prophecy. If such heretical “Christians” persist in evangelizing incorrect interpretations, they are extremists vis-a-vis Christianity as codified in the Bible.

Likewise, if any Muslim tries to declare that Muhammad (who personally led dozens of offensive military excursions, took slaves for himself, demanded 20% war booty, raped a 9-year-old concubine, ordered the assassinations of his detractors—all recorded in official ISLAMIC texts!) never intended his scripture to represent Islam, but rather Muslims should be peaceful and loving when such advice is not given in his scripture (in fact it is revealed in the scriptures Muhammad tried to eradicate), they are not mainstream...they are the true extremists. You cannot lie about your religion and consider yourself “moderate.”

We have hundreds of commandments by Muhammad that declare such things as:

“Be not weary and faint-hearted, crying for peace, when ye should be uppermost (in conquest): for Allah is with you, and will never put you in loss for your (good) deeds.” Quran 47.035

“Fighting (in wars to advance Islam) is prescribed for you, and ye (may) dislike it. But it is possible that ye dislike a thing which is good for you, and that ye love a thing which is bad for you. But Allah knoweth, and ye know not.” Quran 2.216

“Fight those who: believe not in Allah nor the Last Day, nor hold forbidden that which hath been forbidden by Allah and His Messenger, nor acknowledge the religion of Truth, (even if they are) of the People of the Book, until they pay the Jizya with willing submission, and feel themselves subdued.” Quran 9.029

Passages like these and worse are all over the Quran and Muhammad proved their meaning by the perfect records of how he conducted himself in life, as recorded in the Hadith.

7_ So what we have is this: we have a group of personally non-violent, well-meaning, friendly perhaps, but quite ignorant, and non-intellectual people such as the advocates of the “Secular Islam Summit” who seek to censor all the evil that is expressed within Islamic scripture as commandment, and yet seek to somehow allow the resulting “moderated” cult to retain its brand name, “Islam.”

These people use confused logic, denial and censorship to create what they call “connections” and “bridges” between normal human behavior and those who refuse to abandon that which is manifestly evil. They assist ignorant Muslims in surreptitiously redacting most of their own scripture and all of Islam’s raison d'etre, yet they refuse to call for the abandonment of the religion itself, and certainly refuse to admit that the reason reform is sought is because the religion they minister is full of antisocial, animus and hatred....ergo, evil.

These people are secularists who desire Islam to be restrained, so they can assert that their policies of dilution are good for all religions. In doing so, they seek to throw the baby out with the bath water, for not all religions are in fact evil.

8_ But once this liberal process of ambiguating religion is understood, we can also understand why their task is futile. “Moderating” by ignoring the truth cannot work unless the Quran itself, and much of the life and traditions of Muhammad recorded long ago, are universally destroyed to the last manuscript and digital file...and good luck with that.

Since this is impossible, one day even under the most successful liberal scenario where Muslims have forgotten their religion, some 16-year-old Muslim boy will bother to read the original works of the Satanic and evil Muhammad, and refusing out of sin of pride to abandon the cult, the whole sick, violent history of the Islamic juggernaut will rise again from the ashes of the books burned by self-described moderates.

Here, many uneducated people refer to the history of Christianity and its reformation, and perhaps to a general view of the dialectic of movements in general, which they believe go from pure to corrupt, then to reformist, then to post-modern. But applying this supposed deterministic process to Islam is absurd. Christianity was most certainly corrupted by the 13th century. By the 15th century, the church had become even more corrupted: acts such as the sale of indulgences, the sins of the papal rivalries, and its repression against heretics were legion.

When Martin Luther nailed his list of 95 grievances to the door of the Wittenberg Church, he was scripturally correct. In fact, the Catholic Church had gone so far as to make it illegal to print the Bible in any language other than the dead Latin (used as a code language by the church, since only Catholic-trained men were taught the language). But church chicanery was anti-Christian according to the actual Bible. So from the perspective of scripture, the reformists were correct, and the Popes were divergent, and that is what led to the Reformation.

Contrast this with what the so-called reformists are trying to do with Islam...they are not looking into the Quran for answers...they are banning the book altogether lest people find out the evil that drips from its pages. The Quran is the last place Islamic moderators look for help in “reforming” Islam, because it would make al Qaida look like a poodle pet-owners convention. In fact, doesn’t it take great chutzpa to call a movement that seeks to eradicate the letter and intent of actual scripture “reformist”? Perhaps “retardation” or “revisionism” would be better terms.

9_You can restrain Islam, but you cannot lie about its true character by branding those who abide as “extremists,” and complimenting those who abandon all but its name as “Moderates.”

10_The ludicrousness of their chosen position is exactly why “moderate” Muslims refuse to engage in a battle of truth using Muslim scripture to back up their preposterous denials. They can’t read their book out loud because they are canonically wrong and they know it. And this is precisely why the vast majority of Muslims prefer to name their children “Muhammad” or “Osama” rather than march in the streets to protest the evils that this religion does on a daily basis.

This is also why liberal appeasers in 1938, who refused to call Hitler “evil,” got the world into so much trouble by creating a similar confused intellectual forum about the Nazis. They tried to build bridges to the “moderate” Nazis; they lectured clear thinkers about the dangers of inciting German hatred by pointing out the truth. They accused conservatives of being “just as fascist” as the Nazis; they sent ambassadors and made treaties and trusted that the moderates would come out and “reform” their zealous leadership. And they were wrong.

We in the United States need to embark on a comprehensive legal, educational, and social campaign to eradicate the deadly plague of Islam. We need to immediately stop appeasing the Muslims and call Islam for what it really is. By effective action, we may even save those peaceful and self-styled moderate or secular Muslims from their own deluded affliction.

There is nothing that I would love more than witnessing all Muslims become ex-Muslims and full-fledged members of a diverse, tolerant and democratic society. I hope that Muslims themselves leave this Bedouin slaveholder cult. Yet, the hope is extremely slim. Islam has a stranglehold on its slaves and will neither let them go, nor do the Muslims seem to have the insight or the will to leave it in large numbers. But hope, as slim as it is, keeps me sounding the alarm before the fire of Islam engulfs us all.

Sunday, January 23, 2011

The National Intelligence Estimate regarding Iran’s bomb project has stirred a great deal of controversy. Some say that there is now reason to abandon the war posturing and start negotiating a live-and-let-live deal with the Mullahs, since they have “abandoned” their quest for the bomb. At least that is what the not-so-reliable report seems to imply. Others, with good reason, remain skeptical of both the validity of the report and the ever-cheating, conniving Mullahs.

This controversy aside, the irrefutable fact is that the Jihadist belief of Islam itself poses existential danger to the world. Beliefs energize and direct actions. Beliefs are as indispensable as the air we breathe. Even an atheist is a believer, with his own system of disbelief. Not believing in anything is mental breakdown. There is something about humans that demands a belief. A belief can be anything or a combination of many things; it can be well-defined and even rigid, or a loosely put together hodge-podge with considerable latitude. It can be magnificent or the most abhorrent. But, it has to be there. Beliefs steer our vehicles in the journey of life.

A peculiar thing about beliefs is that they don’t have to be based on reason. Rationality does not have full charge of the human mind. Emotions, fantasies, misperceptions and a host of other operations make us the muddling fuzzy-thinkers that we are. A constant upheaval rages in the arena of the mind where all kinds of clashing forces and conflicting information vie for a place. All along, some mysterious housekeeper of the mind works at maintaining a semblance of coherence and order.

It is in the chaotic, fallible and conflict-ridden battlefield of the mind that beliefs are subjected to constant assaults as well as reinforcement. Somehow, usually in early life, the foundation for a belief system forms. Once this happens, the person tends to build on that foundation and protect it against anything that aims to change or undermine it.

The importance of early years in belief formation was recognized centuries ago by Saint Augustine, who said something to the effect: give me a child until he is seven and he will be forever mine. Sigmund Freud’s entire theory of Psychoanalysis is based on the primacy and importance of childhood experiences and education. The famed behavioral psychologist J.B. Watson went even further by declaring:

“Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed, and my own specified world to bring them up in and I’ll guarantee to take any one at random and train him to become any type of specialist I might select – doctor, lawyer, artist, merchant-chief and, yes, even beggar-man and thief, regardless of his talents, penchants, tendencies, abilities, vocations, and race of his ancestors. I am going beyond my facts and I admit it, but so have the advocates of the contrary and they have been doing it for many thousands of years.”

What Watson said may not hold perfectly in every case. Yet, the essence of his boast is indeed supported by numerous studies. Early environmental influences play the primary role in programming the mind and setting it on its course. In actuality, the brain seems to say: first come, first served. It is for this reason that Muslims are overwhelmingly born to Muslim parents, Hindus to Hindu parents, Catholics to Catholic parents, and so on.

This is not to say that changes, even major changes, are not possible after the early years. They are possible and they do happen in some instances. However, in order for significant changes to occur, major re-working must take place in the mind. Change is effortful and the law of conservation of energy also applies to the working of the mind and mitigates change unless the incentives to do so overcome the default mode of inertia.

The parents, other adults and children, as well as the prevailing culture are powerful teachers and trainers of the young mind. In the Islamic world, for instance, Islam permeates every aspect of life with overbearing severity. The young mind has little access to competing non-Islamic input. As the child’s foundation of belief forms, the mind works to protect it, further reinforce it, and bar, falsify, or dismiss any ideas that may clash with its already in-place contents.

As humans, we lack comprehensive preprogrammed software, instincts, to direct us in life. We, however, are born with pre-dispositions which are the rudiments of software programs that will be further elaborated in interaction with life. We are, therefore, importantly dependent on how we and others, and in what fashion, further elaborate the rudimentary software. Somehow, there has been a trade-off. As our brain evolved both in size and power, what few instincts we may have had gave way. In a real sense, we took more and more charge of our own destiny.

As humans became more autonomous, a brain operation called “Confirmation Bias,” evolved to maintain internal harmony within the mind. Studies have shown that when Confirmation Bias is at work the brain areas ordinarily associated with rational decision-making are inactive. By contrast, an elaborate network of brain structures that process emotion and conflicts are highly activated. In short, confirmation bias has its own brain resources that shut out the reasoning parts in order to protect the already in-place beliefs and preferences.

The Confirmation Bias protects beliefs, values and ideas, be they political, religious, or of any other type; it is also helped in the discharge of its functions by the mind’s defense mechanisms such as rationalization (faulty reasoning) and denial (refusing to accept the reality of the irrefutable). Allocation of extensive faculties of the brain to content protection demonstrates the critical importance of the mind’s belief to its normal functioning.

The mind, concurrent with fiercely protecting its belief, actively seeks to further reinforce it with whatever supporting evidence it can muster. Total or major replacement of beliefs, particularly as one gets older, becomes less likely, yet it happens occasionally. Ideas, on the other hand, are much more amenable to change, replacement, or discard as long as they do not substantially undermine the integrity of the overall belief.

However, if a person’s ideas keep on changing gradually, they may swing the balance in favor of a total belief change. This is how Muslims usually become apostates, for example. Therefore, it is imperative that the belief of Islamofascism be challenged at every bend to make the Muslims start thinking and re-examining their ideas of faith.

Forming a religious belief is primarily an emotional undertaking. Therefore, reason must work extremely hard to override the emotion-based belief. Yet, it can be done.

There is nothing inherently wrong with religion. Religion can be a tremendous force for the good. However, when religion, this feeling-based belief, is filled with superstition, intolerance and hatred, then the observer of that religion embodies those qualities and becomes a menace to the self and to others. Feelings energize actions. Destructive feelings energize destructive actions.

Muslims living in theocratic states, in particular, are victims of their religious brains. Their religious brains are indoctrinated from the moment of birth by an extensive ruthless in-power cadre of self-serving clergy who are intent on maintaining their stranglehold on the rank and file of the faithful who are their very source of support and livelihood.

The mullahs and imams, as well as parents and others, envelop the receptive mind, feed it their dogma, and shield it from information that may undermine or falsify their version of belief.

Islamofascism is a pandemic fiercely-promoted belief system that enjoys a huge advantage over the competition. Some of the reasons for Islamofascism longevity and success are listed below.

* It is a crusading belief. Early on, it forced itself by the sword and as time went on it employed any and all schemes to promote itself while destroying the competition.

* It mandates prolific procreation on the faithful. It allows a man to have as many as four wives concurrently, in part to cater to the lust of the men and in part to produce more children who would, in turn, swell its ranks.

* It gets the first crack at imprinting its dogma on the blank slate of the child’s mind from the very first day of birth. The imprinting is usually deeply engrained and makes it difficult for the person to fully erase it, or replace it altogether. Even when successful, an ex-Muslim, or a “cultural” Muslim retains on his slate some traces of the early imprints. It may take more than one generation to fully erase the Islamic imprints.

* It does not allow anyone the choice of leaving its fold at the penalty of death for apostasy.

* It holds that the earth is Allah’s and no non-Muslim is entitled to the same rights and privileges reserved for its own members. Even the “people of the book,” Jews and Christians, must pay the religious tax of jazyyeh to be allowed a subservient place under the Islamic rule.

* It campaigns ceaselessly at propagating itself by any and all means, while banning other religions from so doing. Islamic proselytizers invade the lands of the unbelievers and work relentlessly to convert others while non-Muslim faiths are even barred from having a place of worship in lands such as the cradle of Islam, Saudi Arabia.

* It is anathema to many of civilized humanity’s values, such as those enshrined in the first amendment of the Universal Declaration of the Human Rights.

* It is a caste system where the male believer enjoys valued privileges denied to all minorities, women and slaves. This discriminatory provision guarantees generation after generation of avowed in-power adherents who would shirk at nothing to maintain their privileged status granted to them by Allah.

* It is a powerful carrot-and-stick system of belief. It maintains its stranglehold on its obedient followers by promising them unimaginable compensations, if not in this world, then assuredly in the next, while anyone who strays from the mandated path is threatened with a raft of unending horrid torture from a vengeful Allah.

* The extortion-high oil prices that oil-rich Muslims extract from the addicted and oblivious non-Muslim world fuel the Islamic jihad throughout the world. Muslim kings, emirs and sheiks enjoy opulent life and aim to have it the same in Allah’s next world by funneling a portion of their huge parasitic income to madresehs (religious indoctrinating schools), mosques, storefront recruiting centers and charitable outlets that would enlist and hold masses of choiceless and fanatical believers. By funding these activities in the service of the jihadist Islam, these in-power Muslims believe that they can have it both ways: a material existence of great enjoyment here and an eternal life of hedonism in Allah’s promised paradise. In the bargain, these ringleader menaces of the world, aim to assuage their guilt feeling resulting from oppressing the impoverished exploited masses of Muslims with the delusion they are furthering Allah’s cause.

The danger of the bomb in the hands of the Mullahs has not disappeared, in spite of what the mainstream media and the Useful Idiots claim by misrepresenting the NIE report. The NIE guesses that the Mullahs seem to have ceased the construction of the warhead in 2003. How can the CIA be sure that this is the case and that the Mullahs are not secretly constructing it? Yet, the IRI, by its own admission, is on a crash program to develop long range missiles and operates cascades of centrifuges to make enriched weapon-grade uranium needed for the bomb.

The handwriting is on the wall. Huge numbers of Muslims, overwhelmingly poor, under-educated, and deeply indoctrinated in the jihadist belief are invading the world. It is this human bomb that must be diffused as well as keeping a vigilant eye on the other one that Iran’s Mullahs are relentlessly pursuing.

In short, never mind the nuclear bomb, if you like. But, we must do all we can to erase the suicide-homicide belief-vest that Islamofascists straps on their masses of the poor, the undereducated, and their deluded followers.

“Think globally, act locally,” is the rallying cry of the environmentalist movement. The same exhortation even more urgently applies to the fight against the deadly spread and menace of Islamofascism

Thursday, January 20, 2011

The Middle East “peace process,” as in Macbeth’s great soliloquy, “creeps on this petty pace from day to day,” depleting its innumerable tomorrows and leading to nothing but misery and despair. It has only “lighted fools/The way to dusty death” and to failure after failure, being quite definitely “a tale/Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,/Signifying nothing.” Of course, the bitter and mephitic Scots laird is speaking of the futility of life while we, on the other hand, are considering the total senselessness of a quixotic and fugitive political enterprise that is heading nowhere except endless stalemate or renewed conflict.

Surely, it has become obvious by this time, after sixty-plus years of tractionless discussions and bloody confrontations, that the current negotiating paradigm of Israeli concessions for Palestinian recalcitrance, that is, land for no peace and a raft of further demands, is simply not working, nor is it going to work. Why the Israeli leadership ever embarked on so fruitless a project is beyond rational explanation. In matters of life and death, unanchored hope is no substitute for hard-headed assaying and a grounding in history. For peace to have even an unhouseled ghost of a chance, several correlative concessions on the part of the Palestinians would be absolutely mandatory. For example:

The Palestinians would have to agree that a Palestinian state would be no more Judenrein than Israel would be, let’s say, Muslimrein; there are one and half million Arabs resident in Israel, most of whom will not surrender their Israeli citizenship. Why then should 300,000 Jews living in Judea and Samaria be evicted from their homes?

The Palestinians would have to realize that their insistence on the “right of return” to Israel of seven million so-called “refugees” is a complete nonstarter, and must be dropped from their negotiating position. Israel is not about to commit demographic suicide.

They will be required to recognize Israel as a Jewish state.

They will have to accept Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and Ramallah as the capital of Palestine.

They will need to be reminded that the “green line” is not an officially ratified international border but merely a temporary armistice line, allowing for adjustments that ensure Israel’s retention of strategic depth. For the Palestinian Authority to assume that its proposed or unilaterally declared state would abut the pre-1967 borders is a violation of UN Resolution 242. Moreover, Clause 5(2) of the Rhodes Armistice Agreement of 1949 stipulates that “In no sense are the ceasefire lines to be interpreted as political or territorial borders” and that they do not affect “the final disposition of the Palestine question.”

They will consent to cease promulgating anti-Jewish hatred in media and mosque and to erase anti-Israeli incitement from textbook and classroom.

Given Israel’s meager territorial scale and the volatility and inherent violence in the region, especially the aggressive meddling of Iran in local affairs, the smuggling of rockets and other armaments threatening Israel, and the inroads made by al-Qaeda and its offshoots, the Palestinian Authority will be compelled to permit a defensive Israeli presence in the adjacent hill country.

The likelihood of the Palestinian Authority agreeing to even one of these conditions is virtually nil. But in order for a viable peace to take root, all of these conditions would need to be implemented. Further, none of the desiderata I have listed resolves the dilemma of a Hamas terrorist government solidly entrenched in the Gaza Strip and committed to the destruction of Israel. Neither do these terms take into account a bellicose Hezbollah, equipped with 40,000 Iranian and Syrian supplied rockets, camped on Israel’s northern border. The creation of a Palestinian state would do nothing to defuse the tensions in the area and would conceivably only serve to exacerbate them. For even should the above provisions be settled upon, there is no guarantee that the new Palestine would not join the Islamic axis. Ultimately, as Jonathan Spyer cogently argues in The Transforming Fire, the conflict is not really about borders per se. It is simply one aspect of a world-historical clash between a Hydra-headed Islamic collective and a half-dormant Western world, with Israel in the immediate firing line.

Whither, then, peace? A realistic assessment of the situation would indicate that peace, a harmonious resolution of competing agendas, will always recede the closer we seem to be approaching it via road maps, Quartets, direct or indirect negotiations, interim agreements, or any of the diplomatic sedatives currently on offer. According to recent polls, the bottom-up approach adopted by the Israeli government, stoking the Palestinian economy and building its productive base, has not materially altered the fierce anti-Israeli consensus among the populace. As Jonathan Rosenblum writes, “There can be no peace at present — and perhaps ever — because the Palestinians have pursued not a two-state solution, but a two-stage solution, of which the second stage is inevitably the establishment of a unitary Palestinian rule from the Mediterranean Sea to the Jordan River. Even those Palestinians who profess to support a two-state solution, make clear to pollsters that they do not see it as a final solution, but merely as a stage to a takeover of the Jewish state, which they will never, in any event, recognize as such.”

Peace in the Middle East is, in any sober analysis, probably and at the very least generations away from accomplishment. Peace may emerge after another thirty or fifty years of grinding exhaustion or a major outbreak of hostilities that leaves the belligerents incapable of pursuing so debilitating a struggle. And this is a best case scenario.

But there is another possibility, which is to give up entirely on a “peace process” that, thanks to Palestinian intransigence and Islamic Jew-hatred, is doomed to bankruptcy. An unsentimental view of life would conclude that there are some problems in this world for which there are no good solutions, only modes of containment. Iran is a problem with a solution; Israel/Palestine is not. The modus operandi in the Holy Land, such as it is, involves accepting the necessity of an armed truce, punctuated by occasional pre-emptive strikes and local flare-ups, on the model of managing an incurable disease. For if a disease is incurable, it is utter folly to imagine that it can be made to disappear courtesy of some miraculous cure. And the Middle East disease is, frankly, incurable.

As I wrote in The Big Lie, what I am suggesting is, after all, not something that we regard as unacceptable or morally objectionable in everyday life. We understand that it would be perilous to succumb to unfounded aspirations and pious notions by dismissing facts and embracing unrealistic choices. If we discover that we are suffering from diabetes, there is no point in believing that the disease can be made to reconsider. Rather, we must rely on daily treatment, however irksome it may be.

Put simply, we often have to do what we would prefer not having to do. In private life, such constraints may be financial or medical, but the ultimate purpose is survival — just as it is in the realm of national existence, even if this means having to stay on a permanent war footing. If you have to take insulin, then you have to take insulin, or die. If you have to pay down a mortgage, then you have to pay down a mortgage, or lose your house. And if you are dealing with an enemy that has a 1400 year history of conquest and spoliation, and which is committed to your annihilation, then you must remain in a state of perennial military readiness and be prepared to defend yourself in perpetuity. Clearly, this is not a pleasant option but, unfortunately, there is no other feasible alternative. What is true for people is also true for a people. I, for one, cannot see the value in pretending otherwise.

Israel cannot afford to capitulate, not only to its self-declared enemies but to its own passionate yearning for peace. Falling backwards over the possibility of peace is a bungled negotiating paradigm, as Oslo made painfully clear. Any Israeli politician still hooked on Oslo represents a threat to his country. The same applies to the Israeli left — Kadima, Labor, Meretz, Haaretz, the peace constituencies, a treasonable professoriate and many NGOs — who are essentially a pack of useful jewdiots, victims-in-waiting of their own self-immolating policies.

Similarly, any Western diplomat addicted to untenable proposals and implausible assumptions about the achievement of a stable and long-lasting peace in the Middle East represents a threat to Israel as well, and, indeed, to the entire region. When EU foreign policy chief and resident gargoyle Catherine Ashton asserts that there is “no alternative to a negotiated deal,” she displays only ignorance and bad faith, weeds which spring from the mounting dung heap of EU policy-making and British anti-Semitism. Ashton is not referring specifically to Mahmoud Abbas’ threat to declare statehood unilaterally, which would make a modicum of sense if she were. Like her blinkered counterparts — Tony Blair, Hillary Clinton, Dennis Ross, Tzipi Livni, Ehud Barak and others — she is insisting on a wider program that envisages what is both counter-productive and impossible.

In the international theater, it is fair to assume that the United States will never form a friendly alliance with Russia or China but must stay alert and maintain a credible deterrent capability, regardless of commercial exchanges and temporary reciprocities. On the level of the individual, as I have argued, one does not resist the need for medication or medical procedures if one desires to prolong one’s life. It is no different in the Middle East, in particular with respect to the survival of the Jewish state.

Is peace possible in the Middle East? Will Israel manage to arrive at an entente cordiale with its implacable Muslim enemies, whether on its own initiative or with the coercive “assistance” of the West? The answer is no. Or not in the foreseeable future. Militant Islam is not about to go away anytime soon, and neither is Palestinian faux-irredentism, anti-Semitism, or anti-Zionism. “Radical Islam,” writes British historian Andrew Roberts, “is never going to accept the concept of an Israeli state, so the struggle is likely to continue for another sixty years.”

Israel does not have the luxury of losing a war, any more than it does of achieving a false peace. It is not — or no longer — in a position to rely on a slip-now grip-later political system, but needs to react with strength, intelligence, and dispatch. It cannot accede to the Olmertian velleity of being “tired of winning.” It cannot trust the security guarantees of its ostensible Western allies or the United Nations, which are not worth the paper they’re scribbled on. It must, to quote Melanie Phillips, “stop conniving with the premise of their enemies that the Middle East impasse would be solved by establishing a state of Palestine to which the settlements — and thus by extension Israel — are the obstacle.” This is a false narrative that needs to be decisively countered. Israel must also parry the subtle blandishments of the “normalcy tilt,” that is, once memories of terrorist atrocities begin to fade, that life will continue in the cafés and on the beaches of Tel Aviv as per usual. For Israel, with its precarious foothold at the very epicenter of the Dar al-Harb, or Islamic House of War, is not a “normal nation” nor will it ever be.

It is the destiny of the Jewish nation to be constantly in danger of sedition from within and aggression from without. Apart from incendiary violence, it must confront a world-wide disinformation campaign pivoting on what David Harris calls the two “maladies,” namely, the “confirmation bias” (valorizing information unfavorable to Israel, irrespective of its untruth) and “reverse causality” (switching cause and effect, so that Israel is made responsible for the actions of its enemies). Such meretricious impulses or tropisms appeal to both anti-Semites and anti-Zionists and have become the common property of both Jew and Gentile, some Israelis and many non-Israelis, alike.

It is an open question who is more contemptible, the Jew who lights the fire under the cauldron or the cannibal who throws him into it — all, of course, under the sign of “peace,” which is only a synonym for eventual eclipse. It needs to be candidly said. The enemy is threefold: an Islamic aggressor who will not relent, of whom the Palestinians are the advance column; the reptilian Jew who contrives against his own people; and their Western enablers, primarily in Europe and the current American administration. For each of these, peace is only subversion by another name and war by other means.

Israel’s survival, however, is indeed possible, even if peace is not. But it should begin to act in certain demonstrable ways. It must demobilize its homegrown Quislings and intellectual vandals, with argument, reason or, if need be, the application of legal force where appropriate. There is no excuse for hostile NGOs spreading harmful propaganda on the European dime. There is no justification for state-supported leftist professors brazenly undermining the very country that pays their salaries. It serves no purpose to cosset Muslim groups and firebrands who seek to bring down the state, or to turn the other cheek when rockets fall on its civilian communities. In addition, Israel must take control of the explanatory narrative, or, in a current slang expression, “change the diskette.” And the debacle of military unpreparedness and poor leadership, as during the 2006 Lebanon War, must be avoided at all costs.

Forget peace. It’s not going to happen. And it is not a risk worth taking since unchecked sentimentality is the most ruthless of serial killers. Camp David is the inevitable precursor of the Intifada. The situation is admittedly distressing but it is by no means unrelievedly desolate. For Israel will prevail if it succeeds in preserving a reasonable degree of internal unity, and remains confident, steadfast, realistic, and, above all, vigilant.

Wednesday, January 19, 2011

How does it hurt Israel, how does it hurt the Arabs, and what should we do about it?

Dear Friend of Israel, Friend of FLAME:

A young friend, who has just returned from a semester in Alexandria, Egypt, was sharing with me his rather unnerving experience living amongst the Arabs. (Alexandria, Egypt's second largest city, was, you may recall, the site of the recent bombing of a Coptic Christian church.) Above all, my friend was distressed and worn down by what he termed "the Arab obsession with Israel" and Arabs' "incessant blaming of the Jews for everything that's wrong in their world."

He said we Americans have no idea of how pervasive and powerful this irrational attitude has become on the Egyptian "street." It's now literally a way of thinking, a way of life, he attested.

Because of our Western way of thinking, we are still naively shocked when the Arabs look truth in the face and tell an outright lie. We just don't get it. Yet we have so many examples, not just of the Arab on the street telling or believing lies, but Arab governments and the Arab press as well:

- Israel (or the U.S.) was responsible for the 9-11 attacks.
- A recent shark attack at an Egyptian beach was reported by the Arab press to be the work of Israel's secret service agency, Mossad, as was a "spy" vulture captured wearing a transmitter (actually a global positioning device, enabling scientists to track the bird's migratory habits).
- Jesus was a Palestinian (in fact, the only Palestinians that existed before 1967 were Palestinian Jews---the rest were undifferentiated Arabs).
- The Holocaust did not happen (this was the thesis of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's doctoral dissertation).
- The Jews are newcomers with no claim to the Holy Land (despite 1,000 years of biblical history before Jesus and a continuous presence in Palestine since then).

This week's FLAME Hotline, by Lee Smith, a visiting scholar at the Hudson Institute, helps explain why Arabs have so little problem lying and such a small a commitment to the truth. While he argues that these lies ultimately damage the Arab world more than Israel, this is only the case when we expose the lies and replace them with facts and truth.

In short, Arab lies cannot be allowed to stand unchallenged---that's what FLAME is all about, and that's how you can help Israel as well. Please forward this revealing article to your friends and colleagues, so they can be informed about the latest lies the Arabs are trying to foist on the gullible West, including the recent, widely reported, but nonetheless incredible story of a Palestinian woman allegedly killed by Israeli tear gas.

Thanks for your support of Israel and your support of FLAME.

Sincerely,

Jim Sinkinson
Director, FLAME

P.S.

As you know, the Western often press prints Arab lies and checks the facts later. That's why we must fight and win the public relations war for the hearts and minds of the American people. I won't try to kid you: It's a difficult challenge to get the truth out. But we must convince the American people and politicians to continue supporting Israel. The good news is, we're doing it! Have you seen FLAME's hasbarah---our ad on "The Big Lie (I): Are the "occupied territories" really occupied territories?"---which has appeared in publications nationwide with circulation in excess of 5 million? Please take a look at it, and if you agree that FLAME's brand of outspoken public relations on Israel's behalf is critical, I urge you to support us. Remember: FLAME's powerful ability to influence public opinion comes from individuals like you, one by one. I hope you'll consider giving a donation now, as you're able---with $500, $250, $100, or even $18. (Remember, your donation to FLAME is tax deductible.) To donate online, just go tohttp://www.factsandlogic.org/make_a_donation.html. Now more than ever we need your support to ensure that Israel gets the support it needs---from the U.S. Congress, from President Obama, and from the American people.

Assisted Suicide: Who loses most when Arabs lie?

By Lee Smith, Tablet Magazine, January 12, 2011

Israel's enemies are waging a relentless information war against the Jewish state, and Israel is losing. Some pro-Israel activists insist that Israel must play offense rather than merely defend against the constant stream of charges issuing from Palestinians, other Arabs and Muslims, and Western-funded non-government organizations. Still other friends of the Jewish state think it's too late, that Israel has already lost the information war waged by its enemies—with the collusion of the Western press.

An example: Last week, the New York Times reported that a Palestinian woman named Jawaher Abu Rahmah had died from inhaling tear gas after participating in a demonstration against the separation barrier. In response, Israeli military officials, along with a group of pro-Israel bloggers, challenged the Palestinian account, and claimed they had evidence that she died from complications due to the medication she was taking for cancer. Among other tell-tale signs that something was amiss with the Palestinian version, there was the curiously worded cause of death: "Inhaling gas of an Israeli solider according to the family."

The pessimists who think Israel's case is hopeless have a point. It's not clear why both the Times reporter, Isabel Kershner, and her editors at the foreign desk failed to treat the story with more circumspection: If the chances of dying from inhaling tear gas in an open space were not infinitesimal, wrongful-death suits would prevent police forces from using it as it they do throughout the United States and Europe to disperse riotous crowds.

If journalists won't run narratives like the death-by-tear-gas tale through the most rudimentary BS-detector, it makes it harder not to conclude that they are willing to believe the worst about Israel. At the least, this is evidence of a lazy press corps that ought to take its work a little more seriously; at worst, it means that the Western media knowingly participates in a campaign to slander and libel a U.N. member state.

Outside of the Palestinian fable, floated in the late 1990s, about the Zionist chewing gum that made Palestinian women both sexually intemperate and sterile, it's hard to think of a whopper that the Western media has not swallowed whole. Among other exaggerations and outright fabrications was the so-called "massacre" at the Jenin refugee camp in April 2002. The Western press dutifully followed the lead of the Palestinian news agency, Wafa, and reported that thousands, or hundreds, of Palestinian civilians were killed. Even as subsequent reports, including a U.N. investigation, revealed the truth of the matter—56 Palestinians were killed, the majority of them armed combatants—the narrative describing Israeli soldiers as war criminals and wanton murderers stuck.

Even more impressive is when images are attached to the narrative, like when a Palestinian cameraman in 2006 caught pictures of a young girl distraught on the same Gaza beach where, he reported, seven members of a her family had been killed by an Israeli Air Force onslaught. However, it seems now that a Hamas mine was likely responsible for the tragic deaths.

Most famous is the story of Mohamed al-Dura, the 12-year-old Palestinian boy believed to have been killed by Israeli gunfire on the Gaza Strip in September 2000. His last moments were recorded and flashed across the world, turning the boy into an international icon of Palestinian suffering and Israeli brutality. However, the Israelis didn't kill Dura, and it's not clear if he was killed instead by Palestinian gunfire or if the entire episode was staged by a French-Israeli journalist named Charles Enderlin and his Palestinian cameraman. Richard Landes, a Boston University history professor who has done extensive work on the Dura case, coined the term Pallywood to describe the "media manipulation, distortion and outright fraud by the Palestinians (and other Arabs, such as the Reuters photographer caught faking photos during the Second Lebanon War), designed to win the public-relations war against Israel."

But this anti-Israeli misinformation is in fact part of a larger phenomenon. The Arabic word taqqiya is frequently used to denote the kind of dissimulation practiced by Muslims in the Middle East. Westerners tend to abuse the term, as if any Muslim who lies, for instance, about a car robbery, was practicing taqqiya, when he's just trying to avoid arrest as any other suspect would. Taqqiya is a doctrine particular to the Shia, a Muslim minority who, because they have had much to fear over the last millennium from their more numerous Sunni neighbors, are permitted to lie under duress about their real religious sentiments. The concept, however, is a useful reminder that this is a part of the world where saying the wrong thing to the wrong person can be costly.

Nonetheless, Westerners are very sensitive to the idea that some cultures do not value truth-telling in the same way that we do. For reporters it can be embarrassing if your beat is to cover, say, the Palestinian Authority, since the bulk of your work is taking dictation from frequently malevolent fabulists and having to pass it off as though you were interviewing someone actually worth speaking to. But the convention of our press corps is to treat the utterances of Muamar Qaddafi with the same respect due the prime minister of Canada. To fact-check an entire political culture is beyond the pale of Western journalism, so instead we pretend that Arab societies respect the truth as much as we do, for to say otherwise is to sit in judgment over another culture.

Unfortunately, there is no getting around the fact that societies where the truth is just one among many possible narratives are going to fare worse than societies where truth is valued. In Western culture, truth has been virtually deified since the Enlightenment. Beginning in the early 19th century, Middle East reformers have rightly feared that a similar enlightenment in their society, a regime of Arab or Muslim reason, would threaten the entire ruling order, including God's place in it. If reason is supreme, and everything must fall under the scope of the empirical method, then there is nothing to protect the supernatural or divine from the same rigorous investigation. The Muslim reformers looked at the West and saw a civilization to be admired for its scientific and technological progress and pitied for its spiritual malaise. Thankfully for us, even as the crisis of faith must inevitably follow enlightenment, it is only reason that guarantees technological progress.

Arab educators and other liberal intellectuals regularly decry the lack of critical thinking in Arab education, and yet the problem is not the ability to think critically but what it is possible to think critically about. You can't speak critically of political authorities in the Arabic-speaking Middle East or security services will break your limbs and crack your skull, as they did this week in Tunisia. Obviously, religious topics are off-limits in a region where cartoons of a prophet can touch off widespread riots. Once you have circumscribed any limits to critical thought, you have inscribed red lines throughout your society. The reason the Arab countries do not lead the world in any field is not because they are any more violent or stupid or lazy than anyone else; rather, it is because the culture is set against the very principles of reason that make success possible. It is no mystery why Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah must come to New York for medical treatment—even though his country is more than wealthy enough to build first-rate medical facilities. The culture of the kingdom rewards students for memorizing the Quran, not for scientific explorations or pushing cultural boundaries; half of the country's population is not even allowed to drive a car.

Western cyber-optimists argue that information technology like satellite television and the Internet will so inundate the Arabic-speaking Middle East with images and information that it will entirely reconfigure Arab societies. But this has it exactly wrong: Culture is more powerful than technology, and how a society uses any given technology is determined by its culture. This is why no one wants the Islamic Republic of Iran to have a nuclear bomb, but no one has a problem with France's weapons program. This is also why the Internet is not going to open the eyes of those Arabs who are instead more inclined to use it to spread disinformation. Pallywood is nothing more than the nexus where an Arab culture of lies meets Western technology.

That is to say, the Arabs are not winning an information war against Israel, nor anything else for that matter. Rather, the stories and lies they tell to delegitimize the Jewish state are part and parcel of the war that they have been waging against themselves, and with stunning success. The tragedy is that everyone knows where the Arabs are heading, because the signs of failure and self-destructiveness couldn't be clearer—poverty, violence, despotism, illiteracy, mistreatment of women, and the persecution of confessional minorities, like Egypt's Coptic Christian population. The Western journalists and NGOs who repeat and credential these lies are doing no honor to either the values of their own society or those of the Arabs; they're merely helping a culture kill itself.